I think the N97 is a good phone. But why on earth would nokia remove the on-screen qwerty from the phone. It just doesn't make sense. Its software and has no cost implication what-so-ever. Its amazing how nokia, now and then will make a great phone and then do some dumb thing to spoil the overall user's experience.

Granted, the phone is packed with a solid slider mechanism and slide-out qwerty, must you therefore force everyone to use it all the time by limiting their options. Can't Nokia leave that decision to the individual customer.

Now many people prefer to use the phone in portrait mode in variety of situations where sliding out the hardware qwerty and using it with two hands may not be convenient; or even ideal, like you are in social or official function for instance, using the slide out keyboard with its tilting extravagance style draws undue attention. Its more expedient to use is just as a normal touchscreen. But alas there is no onsreen qwerty to work with. This means you cannot surf the web in portrait mode and have a full qwerty to input information comfortably, afterall this should be the advantage of a touchscreen phone over regular ones. Instead of the N97 being as versatile as possible nokia decided to restrict the customer input method because some designer at nokia thinks he's made the best phone qwerty the world will ever see.

I've "fiddled" with my friend's new N97, and I think my first impression would say it all what or how this phone is marketed.
In the Active Standby / Today screen, i.e. the main screen, instead of getting productivity information, like the non-touch S60 or the Today screen of WM, you get pictures of contacts, a Facebook widget, and essentially communicating tools rather than productivity tools.
At first I was surprised since this has a QWERTY keypad and has a nice tilting screen which would suggest heavy e-mail. Just what a business user would want.
But then I asked about the price and realized this isn't a phone targeted at business users. This is marketed more as a "communicating device". Its more for social networking, messaging, chat, skype, etc. Not marketed as a corporate power device. In fact not being used to such a 'concept' when I first slided out the keypad, I went what on earth is happening? Where's this and that. But after a while it makes sense.
Hope this helps people form expectations about the phone.

Omar, 16 Jun 2009You guys before you criticize a high-end smartphone like the Nokia N97, you should be aware th... morewith the latest trend in Mobile computing, people care most about the feature of the mobile. what can their mobile do for them.the era of using a phone for decades is long gone. I had HTC touch from t-mobile since june 2007 still using it til date ,I know u can't believe it. Now i found it hard to use any other phone if its not touch screen because of my htc experience.my spare phone as been Nokia E65,E66 now N85 which I hardly use cos I surf a lot on my mobile nd u can't enjoying doing that on Nokia. all respect to Nokia but things has change

Tiago, 16 Jun 2009From the review: "Another thing that made quite a few eyebrows around the office raise is the ... moreyour 100% correct the D-pad's location is meant for gaming purposes thats y its on the left and not on the right...

Hmm.. long lasting (durable+years=not-samsung)), upgradeable software, all connectivity and covering all the bases simply & comfortably. Nice. Thank goodness its not a Satio or any other short-term Techy-ego-trip that'll soon be replaced Or (Oops!!)dropped from the tabletop... Sensible but capable. A Definite turning point in Nseries ethos, like the Reviewer said... and a smart turn, to. Let Samsung, LG compete in their dick-measuring contest (i thought S.E. knew better than to so eagerly get involved..sad)..lets see how long it lasts without a foundational(i.e.Real)Tech upgrade to their phones. Im banking on late 2010/early 2011 Nokia will change the game again like the N95 - Multimedia Flagship did. Long live Nseries, it seems . . . .

Looks nice and decent.. but it's pricey and the CPU isn't blazing fast. Plus the UI seems to be a bit... well, not mature enough. I think I'll skip it and go with one of the latest E models that have really nice specs and solid build.. E52, E55, E72... they have everything this one has (except the FM transmitter) and are more compact and with a more mature OS.

Plus I don't trust the mechanism in this N97... probably a bit prone to breaking. I like my phones to last years... till and the technologies become obsolete.